The Beef Chief by Peter Gardner, which combines roast beef and cucumber with a spicy peanut-butter sauce on an onion roll, is a top-10 entry in the 11th annual Jif Most Creative Sandwich Contest.
(Katie Martin/Savannah Morning News)

When Sabrina Gardner saw an ad for the Jif Most Creative Sandwich Contest, she knew it was right up her son Peter’s alley.

The 11-year-old has a knack for cooking. He maintains a blog to which he posts reviews of recipes and local restaurants, and sometimes he even makes dinner so his parents can take nights off.

So Peter got to work, trying different combinations until he came up with the Beef Chief, a sandwich that pairs roast beef and cucumber with spicy peanut butter sauce spread on an onion roll.

“I couldn’t decide if I wanted to do a sweet sandwich or a savory sandwich,” Peter said. “... I picked savory because I thought it would be more interesting and a lot of people would do sweet sandwiches more than savory because it’s peanut butter.”

Peter’s intuition paid off. Jif selected the Beef Chief as one of the top 10 entries, and now Peter has a shot at making it to the final round in New York where five finalists will be eligible for a $25,000 college fund. Only online votes stand in the way.

Getting the flavors just right was a family effort. Peter was intent on adding a punch to the peanut butter element with Thai chili sauce, hot sauce and red pepper flakes, and he needed feedback. He’d make sandwiches, cut them up into little pieces and bring them to family members.

“They’d give their opinion, so I’d go back and try it again and keep going until it came to this,” Peter said. “Everybody wanted more spice, more spice, so I just kept adding more.”

Peter might be getting the glory, but the event was rewarding for the whole family, his mother said.

“What I like about it is that he likes to cook, and he likes eating, so this was a good way to kind of enhance what he already likes to do,” she said. “And it was kind of fun trying the different sandwiches.”

Peter winning the final round — or even making it there — would be a nice boost for his future endeavors. While the first-place winner gets a $25,000 college fund, the four runners-up still receive a $2,500 college fund. That could come in handy for Peter, who hopes to attend culinary school at Johnson & Wales University.

“I either want to be an executive chef or a food scientist,” he said, “because I really like science, and I really like experimenting with food. And I like learning what’s in the food.”

Voting to select the final five contestants is under way through Friday, and Peter thinks the Beef Chief has what it takes to go all the way.

“It’s really good if you try it,” he said. “... If I could, I would eat a bunch of them because they’re so good. Yeah. They just, like, have the sweet, the spicy and the crunchiness and, like, all the flavors.”

CAST YOUR VOTE

Go to jif.com/ChoosyMoms through Feb. 1 to cast your vote in the Jif Most Creative Sandwich Contest. The Beef Chief by Peter Gardner and nine other entries are vying for five slots in a final round in New York. The winner of that round gets a $25,000 college fund and the four runners-up receive a $2,500 college fund.

READ PETER’S REVIEWS

When he’s not doing homework, practicing cello or playing baseball and football, Peter reviews recipes and local restaurants on his blog, petesfoodreviews.wordpress.com. He even has his own business cards for the blog — a gift from his father for getting 1,000 hits on the site.